SOCCER REPORT

SOCCER REPORT; European Series Will Return

By JACK BELL

Published: March 16, 2004

Manchester United's season in England may be disintegrating, but there is another money-spinning tour of the United States this summer for the Red Devils.

The club will again have top billing for the nine-team, 12-game ChampionsWorld Series in July, playing matches in Chicago, Philadelphia and East Rutherford, N.J. Manchester United will be joined on the tour by Glasgow Celtic and probably Chelsea, Bayern Munich, Porto, A.C. Milan, A.S. Roma, Juventus and Liverpool.

United, a perennial power in the English Premier League, is in third place, and it was eliminated from the Champions League last week.

ChampionsWorld, which is based in Moonachie, N.J., will make an announcement on its Web site, championsworld.com, at noon Thursday. Tickets could go on sale later this month.

The series will begin July 24, when Chelsea plays Celtic at Seahawks Stadium in Seattle. Manchester United will play Bayern Munich at Soldier Field in Chicago the next day, then face Celtic at Lincoln Financial Field in Philadelphia on July 28. United will end its part of the tour July 31 at Giants Stadium, probably against A.C. Milan, which is the current league leader in Italy's Serie A.

It is also possible that one match could be played at Princeton Stadium; Princeton University happens to be the alma mater of ChampionsWorld's chief executive, Charlie Stillitano.

Los Angeles, the site of the Manchester United-Club América match last year, has been dropped from the tour and replaced by Toronto, which will probably play host to a match between Celtic and an Italian club on either July 30 or 31.

As was the case last year, grass fields will cover artificial surfaces in Seattle, the Skydome in Toronto and Giants Stadium in the New Jersey Meadowlands.

All of the clubs will be operating on tight schedules, coming to the United States only weeks after the European Championships in Portugal and at the end of the Copa América tournament in Peru.

There is also a possibility that one of the clubs in the ChampionsWorld series could be involved with Major League Soccer, which has been seeking a top European club team to play a league all-star team on July 24.

METROSTARS

Losing a Draftee on a Trip to Spain

The money talked, and Oliver Occean walked away from the MetroStars to Norway.

Occean, a striker from Canada who played in college at Southern Connecticut State, was drafted by the MetroStars in the third round (61st over all). And, like the majority of draft picks in Major League Soccer, he was not offered a contract by the league. But he traveled to Spain with the MetroStars for La Manga tournament.

''If we hadn't gone to Spain, in all likelihood he would have signed with us,'' MetroStars Coach Bob Bradley said in a telephone interview from Florida, where the club is now training. ''I'm pretty angry and disappointed about it.''

Instead, Occean played well and caught the eye of scouts from the Norwegian club Odd Grenland, which signed him to a three-year deal for about three times the M.L.S. annual minimum of $24,000, according to his agent, Patrick T. McCabe.

''He was still trying out and his play got better and better,'' McCabe said in an e-mail message. ''A month ago we weren't sure he would make the squad. Essentially, there is a flaw in the system. These kids are not getting paid. Nowhere else in the world do kids go on trial for a month. Obviously folks are not pleased with this, but such is the business.''

IN CAMP -- The second-year players Ricardo Clark and Mike Magee have returned to training after each had hernia surgery. . . . The Ugandan defender Tenywa Bonseu, acquired in the off-season from Dallas, is with the club in Florida after clearing up problems with his visa.

ON TV -- Fox Sports World will broadcast three of the MetroStars' regular-season matches in its 28-game regular-season schedule. All of the matches will be broadcast on Saturday evenings, including eight West Coast games that will start at 10 p.m. Eastern.

Corner Kicks

WORLD CUP QUALIFYING -- In a Concacaf World Cup qualifying match Sunday, Grenada eliminated Guyana and advanced to the next round, where it will play the United States on June 13 at home and June 20 in Grenada.

WORLD CUP QUALIFYING II -- Uruguay's roster for its March 30 match against Venezuela includes 22 players who will make the long trip home from Europe for the game.

STARTING YOUNG -- Ajax Orlando, the United States affiliate of Ajax Amsterdam, has appointed Mark Nicole to its youth development staff to develop a program for 4- to 6-year-old players.

NOT SO FAST -- Early in Arsenal's victory against Blackburn on Saturday, when the game was scoreless, Thierry Henry slyly nicked the ball away from Blackburn goalkeeper Brad Friedel of the United States as he was about to punt it. Henry's goal was disallowed, not because he challenged Friedel's possession of the ball but because he raised his foot too high, a dangerous play, according to Referee Alan Wiley. Henry scored 30 minutes later on a free kick.

ON TRIAL -- The Colorado Rapids, who are training in Malaga, Spain, had the 19-year-old Venezuelan Emilio Rentería in camp. Rentería, in his third season in Spain, has played sparingly this season for Levante of the Spanish Second Division, but he could be acquired on loan by the Rapids of M.L.S. ''This is a great opportunity and I would love to play in the United States,'' he told Futbolsudamerica, an online newsletter. ''I would be closer to home.'' Rentería returned to his club yesterday, a Rapids spokesman said.

200TH FOR BAGGIO -- Roberto Baggio, who said he planned to retire after this season, became the fifth player to score 200 goals in Serie A when he got the equalizer in Brescia's 2-2 draw with Parma.

SWEET HOME MELBOURNE? -- Heart of Midlothian of the Scottish Premier League is considering a plan to play a ''home'' game next season in Australia. The club could make more than $800,000 by moving a match against Glasgow Celtic to the 90,000-capacity Melbourne Cricket Ground.

IT'S GREEK TO BOLTON -- Bolton's Greek midfielder Stelios Giannakopoulos is one of only a few players, most of them Brazilian, in the English Premier League with only his first name on the back of his jersey. At 14 letters, his last name would not fit.